in fact the nunes memo. but this lays out in about 10 or 11 very clear, concise pages exactly where the nunes memo erred. in my reading of this the most important takeaway here is the fact that the democrats contend the steele dossier was not in any way used to as a predicate for the july 2016 launch of the investigation into the trump campaign. it was in fact the information that george papadopoulos provided to the australian ambassador in london, but it's not until seven weeks later that the fbi actually obtained the steele memo. so any notion that the steele dossier including its salacious allegations was at all the predicate for what has turned into the special counsel investigation has been blown out of the water. >> for anybody joining us i want to reiterate we are talking now about the democrats response, the democrats memo from the house intelligence committee. again, we've been looking through it, as i look at it here hold it up here you can tell there are a lot of redactions, a lot of places where

nunes has not. >> right.t's one of the biggest surprises from yesterday of course was nunes revealing that he hadn't actually looked at any of the understood lying intelligence, the fact that he was so open and candid about that was really interesting. and points to perhaps a larger role for trey gowdy in putting together this memo then we'd initially expected. that said, i think when we look at this rebuttal that nadler has put forth, it's important to put it in a bit of context. nadler only recently rose as the top democrat on the house judiciary committee. he took that post after john conyers left once he was facing serious accusations of misconduct involving several women. this was probably the first major public headline grabbing step that nadler has taken since he rose to that position. it's interesting that he's taking this step as a way of directly going after another committee, another sort of partisan divide but standing up for the fbi which is in his jurisdiction as head of the judiciary chair. sor

and why the nunes memo was three.fully researched memo that, paul, to your point, underscores the fact that carter page was surveyed because he was suspected to be a foreign agent. that was a long-standing allegation, which is why there are multiple fisa warrants that were offered, that were approved. and secondarily, you know, the largest point in the nunes memo was that this dossier was the basis for all of fisa. when again, multiple fisa warrants, and we can see just on page one, there were multiple sources that were used for the october 2016 fisa warrant other than the steele dossier. i anticipate nunes will make a lot of conspiracy allegations because his memo was so poorly written, such a misrepresentation. >> we're going to pause for a moment, give you an opportunity to take a look at that document a little bit more. we're going to continue with this breaking news. the democrats release their rebuttal memo to the nunes memo. we'll have more with our panel of experts and our reporters that are poring through thi

challenging the nunes memo core conclusions.ack with us, charlie savage, msnbc contributor and robert trainham from the bush-cheney campaign and vice president at the bipartisan policy center. robert, we'll start with you. and you heard from the ohio representative there, they did not let them know that this was politically funded but that is not true according to our sourcing as well as other representatives who are privy to the information that indeed they were made aware of the political contributions made to this very report in the beginning. but all said, robert, when we have the nadler response and now we're good to get the official democratic response from the house intel committee, this is the middle of a very busy week. >> one would think. >> one would think. >> this is post-state of the union. this is post record high on -- on the -- on wall street. one would think this is a good week for the republicans when the president tried to pivot to bipartisan issues, but the republican party, my party, put its foot in the mout

i would like to blame it on trump and call this the nunes drop or the trump dump. >> the nunes drop. that seems unlikely. >> there's a top to a market and people want to put a person on top of that. this is the person who turned the market around. and nunes is a guy who is trending on twitter for precisely that. but in essence, it's mostly a market that is taking the technical retrenchment from one that was basically very overextended over the course of the last year. >> you know, that point is interesting. you and i were going back and forth on this. there's an old wall street saying, you buy the rumor, you sell the news. you price in ahead of time. and there was a little bit of that happening with the tax cut. that there were months and months of buying the rumor, and now people are selling the news, meaning now that it's happened, they're getting rid of that -- >> this is all the way -- always the way that markets work. and most of the people on wall street knew that the market was overextended. but there was this great kind of buildup to before the tax cut came. everyone was wait

not just in the nunes memo, but before the nunes memo. they said that the fbi illegally spied on the trump campaign. according to this document, carter page was no longer associated with the trump campaign. as a matter of fact, for the last few months, we have heard repeatedly from the white house that carter page was nobody. he was not involved at all. he wouldn't be able to -- the president wouldn't be able to pick him out of a room, right? so according to this document that the democrats have released here, and according to the nunes memo, the survaiv here, and according to the nunes memo, the survaieillance does n begin until october 2016, which is well past the time carter page is involved with the campaign. that's important to remember. a second thing, republicans have been making the claim, and in conservative media, you heard the fbi paid christopher steele for this dossier. that is not true. the democrats' memo makes that clear. this information we have known for some time. but now, in black and white, the democrats are saying th

nunes: absolutely. [applause] all of this that has happened the last year and a half, it really is something to be a part of, to be in the center of. i will tell you, the american people deserve to know the truth, and the house intelligence committee will continue to plow through our work with or without the support of the media, and we will get the facts. [applause] host: so the bigger the democrats and their allies in the national media make the charge about russian interference, which i know we all find repugnant in our election or in our society generally, the bigger they make the charge that there was apparently something untoward about trump and russian collusion, it is important for all of us to remember, they are indicting the obama administration. the obama administration did not keep us safe. instead, they took the information and used it to go after team trump. is that a fair statement? rep. nunes: yes, there is clear evidence of collusion, you alluded to it. the only evidence we have of coll

nunes does not dispute changes were made.ote in its increasingly strange attempt to thwart publication of the memo, the committee minority is complaining about the minor edits to the memo and two edits requested by the fbi and minority themselves. >> what is not clear this morning is what changes were made and why schiff's staff pushed to check the changes and whether the white house had any hand in the changes. >> nunes refused to tell colleagues whether his staff had spoken to the white house. democrat committee member mike quigley does not believe nunes was being candid. >> he is with a few staff, i think, acting as an agent of the white house and has for the last year. this is the president of the united states acting to defend himself legally and politically at the expense of our national security and complicit in that is the speaker of the house and chairman nunes. >> last year, nunes was forced to step aside after the russia investigation after he went to white house to review classified evidence. >> nunes is also a ke

last week congressman mike quigley confronted chairman nunes on it, and nunes would not be pinned down. apparently the same thing happened today in the debate over the democratic memo. >> i also want to say that my colleague, mr. quigley, again and repeatedly asked the chairman whether he or any of his staff had consulted with, coordinated, conceptualized this memo in combination with the white house. you know, after all, the chairman embarked 0en a similar effort to coordinate a campaign early on in the investigation. and once again mr. nunes refused to answer the questions. at the very end of the hearing, he gave a very lawyerly written response -- or read a written response saying that the white house had not been involved in the actual drafting of the memo. but in terms of whether it was coordinated with the white house or they were consulted or strategized, the whole consent, he refused to answer those questions. obviously there's a very important question for our committee. >> he's talking about congressman mike quigley. joining us is the congressman from illinois. congressman, t

and this is a billboard, one of nunes' democratic challengers put up at his district office, nunes and trump on toddler leashes held by president vladimir putin. there are others calling for nunes to flat out lose his post. nancy pelosi and chuck schumer both called on speaker paul ryan to remove nunes, say his deliberate dishonest actions make him unfit to serve as chairman. 38 years from the fresno bee, covering california's central valley and betsy woodruff, daily beast, who spent the day interviewing sources about nunes. bill, how is this all playing back in his district? >> i think it's a much bigger story nationally, chris, than it is in the district. devin is relatively popular in the valley. as you know, it's a conservative area. meanwhile, because of social media, residents get to see it's a national story and also through shows like yours. that's been an interesting experience. >> what is he like? i mean, this is someone who, i think, a lot of people are trying to figure out his -- what's his angle here? why is he doing this and the way he's doing this? as someone who has cov

we're going with nunes. everyone line up. we're not going to kick out none nunes. we're going to cleanse the fbi, probably the most horrifying phrase i've heard in this latest iteration. and they take their cues. their money is going to come from their party. their support, getting republicans into their district to try to turn out their base. they have convinced themselves they must go along withing there bizarre shenanigan at the risk of national security, at the risk of their own if they have any left intellectual integrity. i also do think that there is something esgoing on here. and that is that they have genuine fear. they have genuine fear come november not only are they going to be wiped out here but they're going to be wiped out in the senate. this is not looking good for 2020. this is going down in flames. >> two things, we should say the trey gowdy stepped down today. chair of the oversight committee. and even as the generic ballot narrows and it has quite a bit, you're watching more and more retirements which makes me think republicans have a bead on th

and you just saw some of the members that said the nunes memo, the nunes memo -- [ sad trombone ] >>harge. that the nunes memo doesn't mean what donald trump and do you understand, paul ryan's selected house intel chairman, really, paul, say it means. calling on trump not to interfere in robert mueller's investigation, four remembers of the house intel committee dismissed the idea that the memo's criticism of how the fbi handled certain surveillance applications undermines the special counsel's work. reps trey growdy from south korea, chris stewart from utah, will hurd from texas and brad winstrop from ohio, by the way, four states the president carried handily. and nobody that is serious believes it means anybody's approaching that. >> it feels like something is protesting too much. with us we have john heilemann, national political reporter for nbc news, carol lee. political writer for the "new york times," nikon necessary sorry ao -- nick confessore and senator kamala harris from california. >> i overheard the senator is in new york for very, very pressing state business. >> oh, g

stating the house speaker lacks the courage to stop nunes. schiff writes, ryan seems not to understand the central bargain after watergate in exchange of the committee for the intelligence community to reveal closely guarded national secrets to a select group of members and staff for the purposes of oversight. they pledge to handle that information responsibly and without regard to politics. >> and chris wray clashing with donald trump over the nunes memo. the fbi issuing a rare public warning, pressing material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo's accuracy. the comments from president trump's fbi chief coming after two days of private talks where top justice department officials tried to convince the officials not to release the memo. here is chief of staff john kelly on the document's release. >> our national security lawyers in the white house work for me and the president. they are slicing and dicing it so we know what it means. >> did you see it? >> i did. it will be released quickly and the world can see it. >> preside

the best rebuttal to the nunes memo is in some ways the nunes memo. there's merit to letting it just stand for itself and letting its hollowness come through to all those who read it or read about it. >> so you think, sir, that the democrats, in their rush to have a rebuttal may be making the wrong move? >> there's a difference here between strategy and policy. i think we can debate the strategy of the democrats getting this memo out. when it comes to policy, though, look, devin nunes in this stunt has put out three and a half pages of untruths and mischaracterizations. so it is on the democrats to correct that record somehow and do it in a way that have above board and in a way that does not involve congressional staffers whispering into the herears of "washington post" and "new york times." >> it tells you that the republicans are on board with their vote, they're doing what they opposed last week, which was to clear relieve the democratic rebuttal. >> in some ways republicans got their point across by beating the news cycle by rye leasing their mem

what is the deal with devin nunes? first tonight's highest thing 1, thing 2 in history next. [ clock ticking ] what can a president do in thirty seconds? he can fire an fbi director who won't pledge his loyalty. he can order the deportation of a million immigrant children. he can threaten an unstable dictator armed with nuclear weapons. he can go into a rage and enter the nuclear launch codes. how bad does it have to get before congress does something? when you have a cold, stuff happens. [ dog groans ] [ coughs and sneezes ] nothing relieves more symptoms than alka seltzer plus maximum strength liquid gels. >>> thing 1 tonight, we think we pretty much settled the question about whether donald trump ad libbed a lie during his first state of the union address. if you missed it, check out the video on facebook. here's what trump made up on the spot while addressing the nation. >> here tonight is one leader in the effort to defend our country. homeland security investigation special agent celestino martinez. he goes by d.

chairman nunes doubling down. there's more to come but it's not going to go through the same process as in a committee vote and redactions. what's going to come here? >> i think hours after the house committee did the right thing and voting nor the democratic memo unanimously. it's disheartening now to see another republican go after another institution of government. just tearing down the system that so many presidents have worked hard and their teams have worked so hard to build respect for. they're going after law enforcement and going to go back to the state department. the morale is already rock bottom. stude people are leaving in droves. students in my class aren't going to do it anymore. it's not a path way that's good. i don't know why he's doing this. it seems to me totally partisan. i think he's wringing discredit on himself. i do not think this last episode has helped his own reputation. >> they had to vote for release the democratic memo. that did not happen. they voted against it. the president tweete

critical of the nunes memo. the fbi and director christopher wray publicly voicing concerns to releasing it. and it seems pretty clear the white house intends to get the memo out one way or the other. last night the president was caught on an open mike saying the chances it being released were 100%. >> don't worry, 100%. >> 100%. that was last night. this four page memo alleges that the fbi abused surveillance act by using the so-called steel dossier as a basis for carter page. for days republicans have been saying that wray, was shown the memo and had no problems with it. here is what one republican congressman said on this broadcast two nights ago. >> the fbi director has seen our memo and only four pages so he could read it readily and come up with an opinion along with two top fisa counsel. no issues factually or thematically raised. >> a lot of republicans on the hill said the same thing. here is what the bureau really things about the memo. quote, the fbi was provided a limited opportunity to review this m

democrats last week said, wait a minute, why don't we hit the brakes on the nunes memo and send the nunes and the schiff memo to the president at the same time, send them out publicly so there are two points of view the american public could digest. the republicans didn't agree with that last week. they moved ahead with the nunes plan. now they agreed to move ahead with the schiff plan. tonight they voted unanimously, giving the president five days to decide whether or not to object or allow the release of the memo, and the question is, what will the president do, which we don't know yet. if he blocks a release, will the house members agree to override the president from blocking the release of the schiff memo? that is an open question tonight, too, erin. a lot of republicans not willing to go that far yet, saying we hope the president releases the memo, but the president has not said what he's going to do, erin. >> that's a crucial question. pamela, i want to get one other big story to you here. that, of course, the plunge in the markets. i've been there on the stock exchange floor for a

joy" where we'll talk about some of the other attempts by devin nunes.ams has much more on the drama surrounding the release of the nunes memo, who will compare what's happening today under the republican party under trump to the mccarthy era. "the 11th hour" with brian williams starts now. republican party under trump to the mcarthur era. the 11th hour with broin williams starts now. >>> donald trump says people should be ashamed of themselves, but then we've got to look at what the memo actually reveals about his own presidential campaign. >>> meanwhile, the russia investigation plows on, a former fbi colleague of the special counsel is here with us live tonight, and he knows how robert mueller works a case. >>> but will mueller's boss survive the trump administration? the president tells reporters, you figure it out when asked if he has confidence in rod rosenstein. the 11th hour on a consequential friday night begins now. >>> and at the end of another week, good evening once ain

chairman nunes did not answer o nor sarah sanders. >> did devin nunes worked with anybody in the white house. >> he worked with the white house before when it comes to intelligence and russia investigation. >> look, we have certainly coordinated with members of congress as it is appropriate as to specifics on this, i don't know the answer. i am not aware of any conversations or coordinations with congressman nunes. >> she's not aware of any coordinations or conversations. the congress is to oversee the white house and not collaborate on some of the national security questions possible. it would be crazy thinking this would be possible, right? sadly, it is not so hard to imagine, in fact, it has happened and it happened with devin nunes. lets go back to march 22nd of last year. >> what i read seems some levels of surveillance activities and perhaps legal but i don't know if it is right or the american people would be comfortable with what i have read. >> so that's congressman nunes last march having just rushed to the white house to brief the president on these allegedly disturbing deta

the nunes memo was only four pages. what republicans pointed out was there didn't even need to be re-daxre da re-dax -- redactions. the democratic memo in order to rebut those charges, it's fascinate to go see they actually quote from a fisa application, this is something the public has never seen before, the kind of information that would be presented to an intelligence surveillance court in order to to do that. it's a consequence of what the democrats feel is so urgent that they wanted to do this. the other point is we've heard from the fbi itself that they didn't want either one of these memos to go out. they actually said it would be reckless, they tried to argue that president trump should not authorize the release of the nunes memo in the first place. they worked, as adam schiff says in his statement today, in good faith with democrats to eventually release their own memo but they would have chosen if they had their druthers to not release either one. this is what people are lamenting here, an increasing fact of l

find it in a subaru crosstrek. >>> so, the nunes memo is a dud. failing to prove that the russia investigation was illegitimate or that it was based solely on the steele dossier. that doesn't mean releasing it may not have grave consequences. "the washington post" reports today that donald trump thought that releasing the memo would help build a public argument against the man standing between him and robert mueller, deputy attorney general rod rosenstein. people familiar with the discussions tell the post, trump suggested to aides that the memo might give him the justification to fire rod rosenstein, something about which trump has quietly mused or to make changes at the justice department which trump complained was not loyal to him. this morning he slammed doj leadership tweeting the top leadership and investigators of the fbi and the justice department have politicized the sacred investigative process in favor of democrats and against republicans. rank and file are great people! so is trump's next act to fire rod rosenstein? three white house o

nunes does not respond to that. the leader of the house republican effort to undermine the fbi's investigation, house intelligence devin nunes refusing to say whether or not his staff wrote this classified memo that they're about to release now in consultation with the white house. i know that sounds like a process thing. if that were to happen, he won't answer if his staff has written it in conjunction with the white house. if this happened, then this firestorm it helped create to help undermine the fbi investigation into itself, into the white house. so this is the white house putting out a document that it wrote to defend itself against the fbi's investigation. and releasing classified information in the process. i know you probably wouldn't wish a life in congress on your worst enemy, but these kind of fights that they're having shows you why it really matters who's there, and sometimes they deal with stuff that is not just consequential, it is freaking compelling to read it word for word. told you this was goin

he's been a long-time nunes kind of loyalist. he was actually one of the staffers that was dispatched to london last year to look for christopher steele kind of showed up at his lawyer's door along with another staffer, nunes staffer and demanded to talk to him. >> right. >> what's his contacts with the white house west wing and the people working over at the eisenhower executive office building? what are his kaks? why would he be over at a place like that? >> it's unclear. but a figure of interest in all of this is a guy named isenberg who obviously is alleged to have given devin nunes the documents to begin with last march. and, or course. >> he was the guy that started the midnight ride over there where nunes goes 0 over to the old executive office building next to the white house, picks up material, goes back to the white house west wing the next day and says guess what i have and clearly was carrying stuff just for trump that made it look like he was some sort of actually a u.s. congress person pretenning to be one. >> the w

nunes, i would just answer, as far as i know, no.of course nunes himself didn't write the memo. his staff did. because he didn't read the background information. so when he was pushed about whether any of his staff consulted with the white house, nunes responds, the chair is not going to entertain a question by another member. sarah sanders also didn't directly deny there was coordination. do you think there was? >> give me a break. i'm going to break the camera in a moment, erin. have you ever worked at washington d.c.? i worked there. in the mid of the highest profile investigation political corruption we have seen since the 1970s in the midst of a precedents of cooperation between the congress including deaf nonnunes and the white house, do you think it was a secret that congressional officials were preparing a memo of this import and nobody knew at the white house? you got to be kidding me. i'm going to tell you the moon is made of green cheese. i'm not saying there is cooperation or collusion. i'm saying in that small town of wa

nunes. course, has been compromised by the russians ever since putin got ahold of his high school yearbook photo. [ light laughter ] that's the actual photo. [ laughter ] [ in russian accent ] "i'm looking at the photo, mr. nunes. there is business in front and party in back. [ light laughter ] you -- you know this photo?" now, in this memo, nunes is claiming the government abused its surveillance powers as part of a conspiracy to target a political adversary. which might make you ask, "what's his background?" is it in espionage, counterintelligence, constitutional law? well, as the "daily beast" reported, the man charged with oversight of our nation's spies is a dairy farmer with three degrees in agriculture. nunes believes his agriculture background informs his work on intelligence due to his familiarity with various farming techniques that have overlapped with intelligence. so nunes and trump have at least one thing in common, their main qualification is that they can both identify a cow.

after weeks of drum rolls, the devin nunes memo is out.t aims to discredit the infamous steele dossier, partly because he leaked his findings to reporter michael isikoff. isikoff is here to discuss. but what if the dossier is neither proof of trump wrongdoing, nor democratic propaganda, but rather russian espionage disinformation to disrupt both parties, and our country? and if this 2005 picture of barack obama and louis farrakhan was made public back when it was taken, it might have derailed his election. what lesson can we learn from that? >>> plus, for this life-long eagles fan, tomorrow's super bowl lii should be a dream come true. so why am i dogged with doubts? >>> but first, at long last, the notorious nunes memo is now in the public domain. this is the outcome sought by congressional republicans and their media supporters, and in the end, the president. whether the release is in their long-term partisan best interest, that remains to be seen. >> and i have my doubts. i say that, because until yesterday the president enjoyed the bes

nunes refused to answer the questions. at the very end of the hearing, he gave a very lawyerly written response, read a written response saying that the white house had not been involved in the actual drafting of the memo. but in terms of whether it was coordinated with the white house or they were consulted or strategized, the whole concept, he refused to answer those questions. obviously that's a very important question for our committee. the reality is that as this investigation has progressed, perhaps more significantly the investigation by bob mueller, as more and more individuals have either been indicted or pled guilty in connection with this investigation and the evidence has mounted, both in terms of the issue of collusion as well as the issue of obstruction, there is a rising sense of panic enclosure clearly within the white house and on the hill as well. as a result we have seen a tactic we've seep in criminal cases where when the facts are incriminating of the defendant, there's an effort to put the government

nunes was eventually cleared. the memo setting up an unprecedented showdown between the president and his hand-picked fbi director chris wray. they asserted they have grave concerns about the material omissions of fact that fundamentally impact the memo's accuracy. they warned it would be extraordinarily reckless to released. chief of staff down playing the concerns. >> it will be released shortly and then it will be released. >> don't worry. 100%. >> reporter: a source tells cnn the white house may release the memo as early as today, possibly with some redactions. it is not clear if it would address concerns about it being incomplete. they informed the president they want to talk about the now infamous statement on board air force one. a former spokesperson plans to tell them that hope hicks sat on a conference call that don jr.'s e-mails with the russians promising dirt on hillary clinton will never get out. leaving corallo concerned hicks could be contemplating obstruction on of of justice. in december, fbi dir

nunes says he didn't work with the white house.hen asked whether his statures did by a democratic member of your committee, he didn't answer. do you believe have or have any evidence this was in fact a coordinated effort? this is an issue, because in the past devin nunes has worked with people in the white house and gone to the white house claiming to be briefing the white house and the president on things which apparently the white house apparently already knew. >> yeah, congressman quigley in our hearing, and it's available in transcript for the public to review, asked precisely that question that the chairman refused to answer. so i don't know the answer. there's a larger point here, and it's extremely important. we asked that as would be traditional with oversight -- remember house speaker ryan called this oversight. as would be traditional with oversight, oversight is about hearings and calling people in front of your committee, asking them tough questions. we asked that the fbi and the doj, both of whom are badly criticized i

and complicit in that is the speaker of the house and chairman nunes. >> in nunes' statement today, he quote, top officials used unverified information in a court document to fuel a counterterrorism investigation during an american political campaign. have you seen any evidence to support that claim? you haven't seen the underlying evidence. nunes himself, to your point, and i talked to adam schiff about this, he has not seen the underlying evidence. >> yeah, here's what i can say. this investigation began independently of the steele dossier. that's as important a statement as i can make. if the minority memo is released and the public or at least congress is allowed to read that, it is a more scholarly report with actual footnotes which will point by to point rebut every aspect of the four-page majority memo. and i believe it will bolster the integrity of the entire investigation. but this is a rush to action. it is not a rush to judge this, it is instead of a delivered attempt to judge the totality of circumstances. we would like to see this turun the light of day where members of co

nunes is hinting there could be more memos to come. nunes says, the investigation is ongoing.e the memo is misleading and omits key facts. joining us, sean turner, national security analyst, laura coats and walter schaub. walter, let me start with you. you called this a dud. why? >> i don't think there was anything in there that we haven't been hearing as party talking points for the past several weeks. there's nothing in there that contradicts the idea that it was papadopoulos talking to an australian diplomat that triggered all of this. >> in july 2016? that's in the memo. >> right. it is. of course, carter page had been under investigation before this started as well. or at least under surveillance. you know, we had been promised a bombshell that was going to make watergate look like a parking ticket. there really wasn't anything there along those lines. when i reached the final page, i kept thinking maybe i hadn't printed out all of the pages. >> you said there's context missing. give us some examples. >> they fundamentally are undermining it. they're saying you have to di

that changes were made by devin nunes without the committee's knowledge. we'll tell you the details on this. it's brand-new information we're getting right now. ♪ ♪ i'm jimmy, this is my definition of fresh since 1983. ♪ we know life can be hectic. that's why, at xfinity, we've been working hard to simplify your experiences with us. now, with instant text and email updates, you'll always be up to date. you can easily add premium channels, so you don't miss your favorite show. and with just a single word, find all the answers you're looking for - because getting what you need should be simple, fast, and easy. download the xfinity my account app or go online today. >>> so there is more breaking news tonight on the nunes memo. this just happened and it's kind of weird. house intelligence committee ranching member adam schiff, a democrat, saying tonight that the memo now at the white house is actually not the exact memo that republicans on the committee voted to release. congressman schiff is saying that it's been altered. he says materially altered from the o

i really think congressman nunes should be embarrassed by what's happening. and i wonder if the very same people in congress and in conservative media who've been saying that sunshine is the best disinfectant, that we all should be seeking the truth, that we should all be transparent, if they're going to be fighting as hard to get that democrat memo out there. and then let's play this out. what happens if the president doesn't sign off on this release of the democrat memo? what does that do to chris wray at the fbi? >> yeah. >> does it force him to come out publicly and start refuting bullet for bullet, line for line, the nunes memo? and ironically put him in a trap where he now appears to be very political, which is the last thing an fbi director ever wants to do. so trump needs to be mulling this over right now. i'm sure he is. but either way it puts the fbi really between a rock and a hard place. >> frank, i want to ask you about some reporting i had over the weekend from the fbi that this process is so sacred and the idea that all these individuals had si

>> i just got off a conference call with members of devin nunes' staff. they went through what they consider to be their key findings from the memo. i can read some of them to you now. it's largely what i should say we have been led to understand by some of the members who have read the memo, i wouldn't say there are two new surprises but let me hit a few points. the first and most important they cited was that the steele dossier formed an senessential t of the fisa application targeting carter page. we knew and have been hearing from sources all along that carter page, this memo was going to heavily deal with the carter page fisa warrant. secondly, none of the fisa applications mention that the fbi had previously paid christopher steele for his work and that -- the other point being that there was also evidence of political bias on the part of christopher steele, both the fact that fusion gps was being paid by democratic sources, a law firm affiliated with the clinton campaign as well as the dnc, but also that steele himself told an fbi agent that it was

i think what nunes, you said chairman nunes, right? >> no, i was talking to chairman goodlatte. from the judiciary committee. >> i'm the ranking democrat on the judiciary. we've had no hearings. no investigations. none. on this. there was some -- there was one witness or two witnesses came in and testified in a confidential setting, not classified, confidential, on things tangential to this. we never went into any of this stuff. >> i want to bring in the rest of our panelists. >> congressman, is it possible that the fbi did not conduct a totally by-the-books operation? >> based on, well, i think they conducted a totally by-the-books operation and the burden of proof is on anyone to say they haven't. and there is no evidence of that at all. >> and you've seened the documents? >> i have. >> so why do you think devin nunes is doing this? >> because he's willing to lie in order to obstruct the investigation. this is a very high-stakes game. we had an intervention in our election by the russians, we had apparently collusion -- clearly collusion by some people in the trump campaign wi

tooth and nail on this release of the nunes memo.is in his interest now in terms of his own prosecution to destabilize law enforcement and to say they are contaminated. >> if rick gate flips, you wonder what he knows potentially that could be a benefit to the special counsel, mueller, get a reduced statement, a plea bargain agreement, what he knows about other stuff. you worked for the intelligence community, u.s. military, what are the consequences for u.s. intelligence if this memo is released? >> i'm less concerned about that than i was a couple days ago. people suggested those concerns have been mitigated. there's a greater concern that i have now. you know, one of the interesting things about the process is that it's not only extremely complex, when it comes to the details of the warrant, but it's classified. so i can see a scenario in which a body of information is put together in a memo like this, and that information could be released and through omissions of complimentary or other information, it's misleading to the public.

you've seen many of the republicans rally around nunes. you saw the house intelligence committee vote unanimously on the republican side vote to release the memo. of course now we have to wait and see what happens tomorrow and whether or not the house votes to release the democratic version of the memo. which of course the white house, the white house deputy press secretary shaw did say that white house would be in favor of releasing that memo. so we have yet to see what is going to happen. >> let me ask you this quickly, barbara. is there concern that president trump may not go after bob mueller, but instead there is speculation that he may go after rod rosenstein. walk us through a legal perspective what kind of cries thas puts us in. what kind of impact does that have on the russia investigation if you go after rod rosenstein? >> i that i could be incredibly significant. perhaps more significant than firing robert mueller. there could be some reason because rod rosenstein approved the renewal of the fisa application against carter page

it was nunes that had to come out. hashtag hysteria that we see on the republican side. it's classic through information enighlation. there has to be more sources of reasons for going up on the fisa collection than that single source. trying to discredit the entire investigation through the dossier which oh by the way when we've gone through the dossier seems to really play out and from a credible source steel who contributed to the fifa investigation. so ultimately the outcome won't be transparency. it will be some his terkysteria you don't know what's true. can't make sense of it. this doesn't even speak to the damages done to our investigation. >> not specific, but still accomplishes goal of muddying the water. of this investigation. joe, also reporting from axios in the "washington post" of concern within the trump administration. the memo may not be as compelling as some people made it out to be. congressman like lee zeldin. >> it's going to be showing misconduct on the part of top people at the doj and fbi. you'r

and devin nunes is from california. adam schiff is from california, as are eric slalwell and jackie speiers. the house process was blown up almost as it started. that's one thing we should keep in mind. every day the people have been questioning devin nunes' credibility and also a day that adam schiff has been attacking the process. meanwhile, again, being from north carolina, i have to point out my old boss senator richard burr is chairman of the senate intelligence committee, that committee has preceded a pace as it should have, moved slowly and methodically and it is also been largely free of controversy and i think we sometimes forget that. >> and a.b., how important will that be when we get findings from both committees, the way this played out publicly, house versus senate, how much could that potentially impact the way those findings are viewed? >> i think doug is right. senator burr is to be commended for the fact that he has really not been tainted by this process. he has not engaged in street fighting partisan